ADCC Rules

Overview

ADCC — the Abu Dhabi Combat Club Submission Wrestling World Championship — is the most prestigious no-gi grappling event in the sport. It ran annually from 1998 to 2001 and every two years since 2003, with one three-year gap between 2019 and 2022. Regional Trials worldwide feed the main bracket.

Two things make the ruleset unlike anything else. Matches begin with a no-points period, so the only way to win early is to finish. And almost every leg lock is legal at every adult level, including heel hooks and knee reaping. Together they reward attacking grappling and punish holding a lead.

Match structure

Every match is split into two halves. The first half scores no positive points; the second half scores normally. A submission wins at any moment in either half.

Match lengths at the World Championship

Round	No-points half	Points half	Regulation
Qualifying rounds	5 min	5 min	10 min
Finals, absolute finals, superfight	10 min	10 min	20 min

Overtime depends on the round. A qualifying round gets one five-minute overtime; a final, an absolute final or the superfight gets up to two ten-minute overtimes. Points, positive and negative, are live throughout every overtime. A superfight can therefore run 40 minutes before anyone is declared the winner.

In a 20-minute match the first half is "no positive points" rather than no points at all — negative points still count from the opening whistle. In a 10-minute qualifying round the first five minutes score nothing either way.

Semi-final length is the one gap in the official text — neither the rules page nor the rulebook names semi-finals. FloGrappling has reported them as 20-minute matches; treat that as reported rather than official.

Trials run shorter: 6 minutes with a 3-minute overtime in the qualifying rounds, 8 with a 4-minute overtime in the finals.

Scoring

Points are awarded by the judges, not the referee, and only in the second half. A position must be held for a continuous three seconds before it scores, and the three-second count starts only once the points are called.

Position	Points
Clean takedown — finishes outside the guard, opponent's back largely pinned	4
Clean sweep	4
Guard pass	3
Back mount — body triangle or both hooks, body square	3
Takedown — opponent's seat on the mat for three continuous seconds	2
Sweep or reversal	2
Knee on belly	2
Mount — both knees below the shoulder line, on the mat	2

Two rules catch people out. Points do not chain: passing straight into mount scores 3, not 5, because ADCC scores the position you arrive in rather than every position you travel through. And nothing scores while a submission is threatened — a position taken while defending or attacking a lock waits until the threat is resolved.

You can win by submission, on points, by referee decision, or by your opponent's disqualification.

Negative points

ADCC penalises passivity directly, and the penalties bite earlier than the points do.

• Pulling guard — going from standing to seated or grounded and staying down for three seconds or more: minus one. This applies in the second half, throughout overtime, and in the first half of a final, where the no-points rule otherwise still holds.
• Disengaging or backing away: minus one.
• Passivity: two warnings, then minus one. After the first minus there are no further warnings. A warning can be issued during the no-points half and the minus applied later.

The referee stops the match to tell both the athlete and their coach about every negative point. Two team-mates fixing a match are both disqualified.

There are clauses covering the turtle and the four-point position that define when an opponent counts as "down" — three seconds in turtle, or hands on the mat — and when sitting to guard is therefore not a guard pull.

Decisions

When a match ends with nothing scored, ADCC's rules page says the referees "decide the winner according to fighter's dominance". The rulebook expands that into ranked criteria: first who was the aggressor and initiated the action — genuinely, since it explicitly excludes fake initiations — then positional control, then submission attempts, judged across the whole match rather than only the overtime.

Legal and illegal

Legal at every adult level

• Heel hooks, inside and outside
• Knee reaping
• Toe holds, kneebars, calf slicers — any leg lock or ankle lock
• Any choke, except closing the windpipe with the hand
• Armbars, shoulder locks and wrist locks
• Can openers and twisters

Illegal

• Neck cranks that trap both shoulders and drive downward pressure into the neck; the full nelson by name
• The crucifix
• Spiking an opponent on the head during a takedown, or spiking their head while they are on your back
• Strikes of any kind, eye gouging, fish hooking, ear grabbing, hair pulling, biting, scratching, pinching, kicking
• Grabbing fewer than four fingers or five toes, and thumbing
• Pressure to the groin; hands, knees or elbows on the face
• Any slippery substance on the skin
• Twisting the chin in a crossface guillotine
• Holding a T-shirt or shorts
• Rolling forward while an opponent has a body triangle or both hooks in

Slams are the exception worth reading twice. ADCC's rules page puts it in one sentence: "Slamming is allowed only if you are locked in a submission. (If your opponent lets go of the submission while you are about to slam you must let go of the slam.)" So you may slam your way out of a lock, but the licence ends the instant the lock does — and slamming a passive opponent, or one who has released you, is a foul.

The downloadable rulebook PDF of 30 May 2026 lists "Slamming is illegal" with no exception, which contradicts the rules page. Where the two disagree, this guide follows the rules page ADCC publishes and maintains.

Weight classes

Men	Women
−66 kg (145.5 lb)	−55 kg (121.25 lb)
−77 kg (169.75 lb)	−65 kg (143.25 lb)
−88 kg (194 lb)	+65 kg
−99 kg (218 lb)
+99 kg

ADCC's own event material sometimes writes the men's limits as −65.9, −76.9, −87.9 and −98.9 kg. It is the same division: the number is the limit an athlete must weigh under, expressed with the allowance taken off.

Athletes weigh in once, the day before competition starts — a change from the older format, where each competition day had its own weigh-in.

Format

Men's divisions run as 16-athlete single-elimination brackets, women's as eight, each with a bronze-medal match. There is also an absolute division, open weight, whose field is chosen on the second day from the athletes who have already competed in the weight classes rather than invited in advance.

The superfight is a single match with no bracket behind it. It is traditionally the reigning superfight champion against a challenger the organisers name; when no champion is defending, two selected athletes contest the vacant title.

How ADCC differs from IBJJF

If you have only competed under IBJJF rules, five differences will change how you fight.

• No points for the first half. An IBJJF match is scored from the opening whistle; an ADCC match gives you five or ten minutes where only a submission counts.
• Leg locks are open. Heel hooks and reaping are legal at every adult level, where IBJJF has permitted them only in adult brown- and black-belt no-gi divisions since 2021.
• Guard pulling is punished. Sitting down costs you a point in the second half, rather than simply conceding position.
• Takedowns are worth more. A clean takedown scores 4 against IBJJF's 2, and the definition rewards finishing clear of the guard.
• Advantages do not exist. A close ADCC match goes to the judges on aggression, not to whoever accumulated near-misses.

See the IBJJF rules guide for the other side of that comparison.